4 Mistakes Every Movie Monster Seems to Make

When watching a horror movie, the viewer's first impulse is usually to point out all of the hilariously bad decisions that the various characters make in their struggle to avoid getting their skulls ripped out of their assholes by whatever howling death banshee or slobbering mutant psychopath happens to be pursuing them.

However, the killer monsters make just as many ridiculous errors in judgment that, in my opinion, are way more unforgiveable. "Why?" it would help if you asked right now. Simple: Because the monsters are generally the only recurring characters in their respective franchises. By the second or third sequel, they've had plenty of time to work all of the kinks out of their murder strategy.

So how come stuff like this keeps happening?

#4. Not Guarding Their Magic Weaknesses

Dimension Films

Almost every movie monster has some magic weakness that they either willingly divulge to their potential victims in entirely too much detail or leave sitting out like a magazine for anyone to discover (they occasionally do both).

Take a look at Hellraiser. Pinhead is only able to travel to Earth from his parallel dimension of bondage hooks and terrifying erections if someone in our plane of existence opens the puzzle box. He and his gang of baffling leather outfit enthusiasts show up to take the unfortunate person back with them for an eternity of extreme torture porn, but leave the box behind.

Dimension FilmsIf it wasn't for the fact that one of them is a woman, I'd say the whole thing was a statement on the sexual selfishness of men.

Pinhead should just take the damn puzzle box -- that should immediately be his goal every time he shows up in our dimension. Why spend years waiting for some hapless bastard to solve the thing and then only take that person? It's not like Pinhead only wants to kill folks who can figure out his puzzle box -- he wants to murder the entire damn universe. If he secured the puzzle box, he'd be able to open the door in and out of his unspeakable gore-boner realm whenever he felt like it. He should write that on his hand or something.

Beyond being a terrible strategy (more on that later), Freddy reveals the biggest ace he has up his sleeve by deliberately telling his victims that A) he is powered by unholy magic and B) they have to fall asleep in order for him to kill them. He'd have a 100 percent success rate if he just kept that information to himself.

Meanwhile, Jason Voorhees is gullible enough to be convinced that any female wearing his dead mother's sweater is, in fact, his dead mother. And he just leaves the sweater out next to his mother's mummified head in a shrine in his backwoods meth shanty. He doesn't fold the sweater up in a drawer or put locks on his doors or anything. Sure, Jason probably doesn't have the level of awareness to recognize that the sweater is a crippling weakness, but he should at least be keeping his most sacred possession in a place where raccoons can't shuffle in and pee on it.

#3. Wearing Impractical Outfits

Lionsgate

Jason, Michael Myers, and Leatherface all wear masks that, while appropriately terrifying, seriously impair their vision to the point of catastrophic disadvantage. When you're doing the creepity-creep through some bushes in the middle of the night in your search for victims, it'd probably be best not to have some asshole gimmick stuck to your face that robs you of your peripheral vision.

New Line CinemaThe addition of power tools just makes the mask even more of a liability.

Pinhead wears this complicated leather outfit that, while appropriate for his transdimensional sex-murder persona, really seems like it would restrict his movement, as well as squeak against his thighs while he's trying to sneak up on people. If he wore velour, or some other light, non-restrictive fabric, he'd have an easier time catching folks unawares and maybe stealing back that puzzle box like we talked about earlier. Really, it seems like a simple wardrobe change could drastically improve his entire situation.

Dimension FilmsThat and some Bactine.

The Leprechaun wears an elaborate leprechaun costume (and also speaks in rhyme like some kind of tragic dumbass, but that is inconsequential to my point). However, killing people isn't really his primary goal -- he just wants his gold, and motherfuckers keep stealing it. The outfit is working against him in that respect -- those buckled shoes were never designed to be worn while chasing down thieves, and they clatter around like Dutch clogs any time he tries to go Solid Snake on anybody.

Lionsgate FilmsAlso, he looks like a lawn ornament, and that's not helping anything.

Getting his gold back would be a much easier task in general if people couldn't immediately see that he was the Leprechaun. He should just wear an oxford shirt and some slacks and tell everyone he's Peter Dinklage, then ambush them when they put their guard down and reclaim his booty.

Bottom line -- if you're going to be lurking around in the dark, just wear a ski mask and some wrestling shoes. Don't be married to a look.